A Life Beyond by Mark Church (ebook reader web TXT) 📕

'Then it's your job to keep them inline, seeing as they are your responsibility...you do remember what happened to Mr Tanner don't you Arthur?' the King leant in slightly and used his first name which Mr Scoot knew normally meant trouble for him,

'I...I do sir...and I appreciate how lucky I am to have this position..I...I will do my best I give you my word..' he replied looking rather worried now,

'YOUR word is...worthless' the King replied 'just follow the books and no harm will befall you', and with that the King turned away from Mr Scoot, winked at Harvey as he went to walk away which made him feel a bit less worried about joining the class.

As Harvey was ushered into his new class he felt slightly odd, his head was starting to feel all fuzzy, like he wasn't in control, followed by a voice, one he had heard so many times already,

'For us to succeed you must be strong...give us more' the ghostly voice said before slowly fading away, Harvey shook his head as if trying to shake off whatever it was he was feeling just as he walked past the door to be greeted by row after row of young children, all sitting there quiet...for now, not one of them smiled at Harvey as he inched his way towards his seat which had been placed in the back corner of the room in what looked like the darkest scariest corner ever seen, he was talking to himself as he went ‘just keep going...don't look at anyone’, all the confidence he felt earlier had suddenly drained from his body and he shuddered as he walked towards his table, pairs of eyes just staring at him, as if looking deep into his soul and beyond.

As he reached his seat in the corner and went to sit down he caught a glimpse of something just close to the door he came in through, a hazy hooded figure stood there for a second then vanished, Harvey just stared at the space where it had been as if he had sort of recognised whatever it was,

'Did I just...I've seen that before I think' he said quietly to himself but loud enough for the boy sitting next to him to be able to hear him talking,

'What did you say Ordie??' the snarling voice snapped back at him out of the semi darkness he was sitting in,

'Ordie??' replied Harvey looking puzzled 'what's one of them? And who are you?', the boy leaned further towards Harvey, sniffed the air around him as if sensing something and still snarling said,

'It's a name for people like you...those who have nothing inside them'

'Oh right that clears it up...thanks for that!!' Harvey said feeling even more confused than ever as he took his seat, just as he did another pupil walked over to him, this time a girl stood there, she leant forwards so her hands were on his desk her face was slightly covered by a mop of long jet black hair, she moved her face closer to his as she stared deeper into his eyes before speaking,

'I see evil in your soul….swirling round like the wind….a cloudy future you have...be afraid of the dark for it will consume you forever'.

Harvey sat back in his chair seemingly too afraid to move,

'Wh...What the heck is going on here!!' his voice trembling as he spoke 'I didn't ask to be in here..just leave me alone!!' he closed his eyes tight hoping they would all go away but when he opened them he was met with the same pairs of eyes staring back at him until one boy at the front of the class got up and stomped to the back to where Harvey was sat,

'Leave him alone Otto!!' came the strong sounding voice 'and you sit back down too Hayla!!, leave him alone right now or I'll turn you both into Lead heads' said the boy as he stared at the other two children with his hand outstretched and a small crackle of lightning seeping from each finger,

'Oooo I'm so scared Pontus!!' replied Otto as he casually laughed at the threat aimed at him 'why not put a spell on your new best friend and make him not look like he's about to cry', all the while Harvey was just sitting there frozen stiff trying not to make eye contact with anyone.

The two children eventually turned away but not before Hayla left Harvey with a message,

'Inside your soul lives something evil, something strong enough to make a difference, when the time comes you must fight...I'm watching you..always'.

'Don't listen to her' said Pontus 'she's been drinking crazy juice again', Harvey stared at Pontus now who was smiling back at him,

'Th..thank you for that' he nervously replied, still not sure what to say or do,

'I'm Pontus by the way, class guardian and, as I'm sure you will find out soon enough, Class champion 2 years running, welcome to ‘Muddy Bog’ the class everyone wants to avoid when they arrive here'

'I...I'm Harvey and I have no clue what's going on!' he replied nervously, not knowing whether to smile or just sit there and look at his desk, 'I kind of get the impression I'm not liked that much'

Pontus leaned on Harvey's desk and smiled, it was a smile that seemed to put Harvey at ease a bit,

'Naah, don't worry about any of that' said Pontus 'they are like that with every new kid who joins the class, they like to let them know who’s in charge but they know not to mess with me if I get involved' 'Oh why is that?' asked Harvey quizzically

'Well….' replied Pontus 'bit of a long story really but shorter version you only need to hear about is that we had a new kid in here quite a long time back, think his name was Archie. Or something, he was really odd...didn't speak to anyone, didn't do any work and just sat there looking down at his desk, just seemed not right to us. So one day he all of a sudden stood up while Mr Scoot was in the middle of his lesson, jumped up onto his desk and started freaking out quite badly', Harvey was taking in every word as he leant forward to be able to listen better,

'And what happened then?' he asked, his mouth now wide open,

'He was screaming about the voices in his head taking over, and how he didn't want this inside him, then his eyes turned a sort of purple looking colour and it all stopped, stood there on top of his desk with Mr Scoot shouting at him to get down at once, but he was having none of it and let out the most ear piercing scream followed by sort of electricity shooting out of his fingers towards Mr Scoot, that's where I stepped in' Pontus smiled smugly as he stood up straight, arms on his hips like a superhero,

'So what did you do?' Harvey was mesmerised by the whole story now,

'I done what anybody else would of done in that situation..' started Pontus, but Otto as usual was listening in and decided to try and finish his story for him,

'He tripped up on his chair while trying to run away from the class and fell backwards against the desk causing the kid to fall off and knock himself out cold…'

'Shut up Otto!!!' shouted Pontus 'that's rubbish and you know it, the REAL story ends like this, I conjured up my own brand of a freezing spell which, may I add is one I thought up myself during class and developed it to perfection, and stopped him in his tracks. Mr Scoot was far too scared to help so I had to step in, that's why he's such a scaredy buffle now' Pontus puffed his chest out and stood there as if waiting for applause but Harvey was just staring in awe,

'Oh is that it?' asked Harvey 'wow that is a great story, so where is the boy now?'

'No one really knows what happened to him' Pontus said 'but rumour has it that he is somewhere in this castle, locked away deep below ground, still trying to get free from his cell', Otto scoffed at what Pontus was saying,

'Oh and who told you that load of old plonk?' came the reply,

'It's true!!' remarked Pontus 'the last person to go find him never returned, It was the old teacher from ‘Elmwood’ Mr…..Astrum, yes that's him, they say all that all that was found of him when they went looking was his cloak, glasses and his notebook of spells sitting outside Archie’s room, very sad situation, he was a nice teacher too!'

'Oh do shut up Pontus. That story gets better and longer every time you tell it!!' laughed Otto, and with that Pontus picked up his school book and hit Otto round the with it with enough force to make him fall off his seat.

'You'll pay for that Polder' said Otto angrily as he lifted himself up off the chair and raised his hands in a sort of attack stance, a low humming could be heard coming from Otto's direction,

'Don't do it Otto' shouted Pontus as he summoned electricity to his fingertips 'I don't want to have to hurt you again!!' this caused the whole class to turn round now,

'MAGI-FIGHT, MAGI-FIGHT' they chanted together,

Just as they were about to get going Mr Scoot screamed at the top of his voice,

'STOP THIS RIGHT NOW YOU TWO!!, there will be no trouble here today ok, if you have any problems go sort them out in the arena, but not in my class!!, DO I MAKE MYSELF CLEAR?',

'Whatever sir..' muttered Otto 'I'll get you one day Polder, just you wait', Pontus just smiled and winked at Harvey who had now slunk down below desk height and was visibly scared,

'Back to your seat too Pontus if you please, I must get this lesson finished before time runs out, and with that he made his way back to his seat, whistling as he went and leaving Harvey totally scared and even more confused as to what had just happened. He sat upright in his seat and looked around at everyone else who were all now looking towards the front of the room as Mr Scoot carried on with his lesson.

'I'd watch yourself too Ordie…' Otto piped up 'don't get sucked in by anything he says, there's a reason we are all in this classroom and it's not because we are the best at everything, we are the kids no one wanted to teach, we are the kids who they can't control and we are the kids who will do just about ANYTHING to survive, you just remember that ok?'

'R..righto..' muttered Harvey as he closed his eyes tight hoping for this all to go away. As Harvey sat there shaken by what had just happened right in front of him he started thinking about what Otto and Pontus had said to him, ‘how am I going to get through this?’ he thought ‘no one likes me’, but just then a voice entered his head and made him sit upright,

‘You will succeed boy....become the best….take them all down…’ then, as they always done the voice vanished and Harvey's head was silent once again. Just the normal shouting could be heard coming from outside, the Arena was buzzing once more.

Chapter Nineteen

First Days Nerves

As the first day in their new school surroundings continued there seemed to be a buzz of excitement around the corridors and in most of the classrooms as the children got to know their new classmates, laughter could be heard echoing around Lillies new class, loud clapping from behind Daniel's class door and from behind Harvey's classroom door….just the usual sound of Mr Scoot shouting at his class and them not bothering to listen, just a normal day for them in fact.

But back in Lillies class everything seemed to be better than